A Christian's Longing for Hajj

It is the season of Hajj. It is the solemn responsibility of every Muslim to go on Hajj if they are able ~ but without accruing debt to do so. I have always been envious of the Hajj. Islam is not unique in maintaining a pilgrim tradition, but its pilgrimage is unique.
There are many shrines in Islam, the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, Rumi's Tomb in Turkey and myriad local sites in countries all over the world, unknown by far-flung Muslims. There are two holy cities in Saudi Arabia, Makkah (Mecca) and Medina, but only one Hajj.
There is no singular call or requirement for pilgrimage in Christianity or Judaism. The Kotel (Western Wall), remaining from Herod's expansion of Solomon's temple is arguably the holiest site in Judaism. But there is no requirement to journey there. Many Christians want to see where Jesus lived and died and rose from the dead, walk where he walked and where he taught. There are so many Christian holy sites: Bethlehem, Nazareth, Capernaum, Jerusalem. So many sites with questionable historicity ~ there are at least two options for the site of Jesus' resurrection. Even dispensing with the one disdained by scholars and locals, there is no single site in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher for veneration. There are many shrines and altars, and I have my favorite.

I would almost prefer it if the Church of the Holy Sepulcher were veiled  and visited as a whole like the Kaaba. (Although I would still want to enter, unlike most pilgrims who are barred from the Kaaba.)
I love the unity that Hajj evokes. There is great diversity in Islam, but Hajj and the other pillars seem to be uniformly embraced without the doctrinal divisions evident in Christianity. There are certainly differences in practice and level (fervor?) of practice in all religions.
I appreciate and respect that part of the sanctity of Hajj is its restriction to Muslims. (In order get a visa one must prove one's Muslim identity, which can be challenging for people who were not born in Muslim countries.) But I would like to experience Hajj, as a Christian.
I have had the privilege of being welcomed into sacred spaces which were not my own in which I was able to experience the richness of another tradition and sometimes find a space where my tradition unexpectedly intersected another. But Hajj is closed to me.
I know that there are many thoughtful critiques of the culture and particularly the economy of Hajj, including gender and other issues. And even if I am romanticizing Hajj, it is a compelling practice, inviting me to think back on my own tradition.
Walking the Way of Suffering, the Via Delorosa in Jerusalem is perhaps the closest I have or will ever come to Hajj in my own faith. Yet the differences are stark: There are not nearly so many pilgrims gathered at one time, even on Good Friday. Pilgrims can come any day in any month. There are no pilgrim clothes. And all around us, life in the shops, restaurants and hostels of the Old City went on. (Which I also appreciate, because I could see Jesus being paraded through the market, full of people.)
I am grateful to sister, scholar and imam Amina Wadud for opening up her Hajj journey in a series of blogs. They have been grouped together here. (At the bottom of the page on that site there are links for the rest.)

Rumi-nations

Love is from the infinite, and will remain until eternity.

The seeker of love escapes the chains of birth and death.

Tomorrow, when resurrection comes,
The heart that is not in love will fail the test.

In the past week I have had two conversations about Rumi.
One person grew up with his book in her home and was familiar with him, but not his context. (She thought he was a Rabbi!)
Another woman uses his poetry regularly in her worship services. She makes it a point to remind her congregation that Rumi was Muslim.

I am blasphemy and religion, pure and impure;

Old, young, and a small child.

If I die, don't say that he died.

Say he was dead, became alive, and was taken by the Beloved.

Mavlevi Jalal al-Din Rumi was a Sufi Muslim. And his poetic passion for God and God's creation flowed from his practice of Islam, and was not in spite of it.

With the Beloved's water of life, no illness remains
In the Beloved's rose garden of union, no thorn remains.
They say there is a window from one heart to another
How can there be a window where no wall remains?

I reflected on this rumination after watching news coverage of the pro-life activist who murdered and martyred a physician for providing legal medical services to women. I am always struck that these persons are never called Christian terrorists even when they like the Oklahoma City bombers and white supremacist who murdered a guard at the Holocause museum draw their ideology and actions from their Christian faith.

It seems that in our news cycles, only Muslims who bastardize their faith are religious terrorists. And Muslims like Rumi, who love God and the world with all that they have and more, are all-too-often lifted from their Islamic context so that a singular presentation of Islam pervades our media.

This is true Islam:

Our death is our wedding with eternity.
What is the secret? "God is One."
The sunlight splits when entering the windows of the house.
This multiplicity exists in the cluster of grapes;
It is not in the juice made from the grapes.
For the one who is living in the Light of God,
The death of the carnal soul is a blessing.
Regarding the dead, say neither bad nor good,
For that one is gone beyond the good and the bad.
Fix your eyes on God and do not talk about what is invisible,
So that God may place another look in your eyes.
It is in the vision of the physical eyes
That no invisible or secret thing exists.
But when the eye is turned toward the Light of God
What thing could remain hidden under such a Light?
Although all lights emanate from the Divine Light
Don't call all these lights "the Light of God";
It is the eternal light which is the Light of God,
The ephemeral light is an attribute of the body and the flesh.
...Oh God who gives the grace of vision!
The bird of vision is flying towards You with the wings of desire.

Peace Be Upon Us

The Holy Qur'an, like all scripture, contains life-giving and death-dealing words. Christians, even when quoting memorized scripture, sometimes know little about their own sacred texts and even less about those of others.
As President Obama invites the Muslim and Western worlds (as though they were separate and distinct) into renewed conversation and mutual understanding, I offer a few verses from the Qur'an for contemplation.

Quranic reflections on peace:
Do not make Allah, by your oaths, a hindrance to your being righteous and observing your duty to God, including making peace among humankind. (2.224)

You believers! When you go out (to fight) in the way of Allah, be careful to discern, and do not say to anyone who offers you peace: "You are not a believer." (4.94, in part)

Go to Pharaoh and say: Look! We are two messengers of your Lord. So let the children of Israel go with us, and do not torment them. We bring you a token from your Lord. And peace will be for the one who follows right guidance. (20.47)

Peace on me the day I was born, and the day I die, and the day I shall be raised alive! Such was Jesus, son of Mary: a statement of the truth concerning which some doubt. (19.33-34)

If two parties of believers fall to fighting, then make peace between them. And if one party of them does wrong to the other, fight that one which does wrong till it returns to the ordinance of Allah; then, if it returns, make a just peace between them, and act equitably. Look! Allah loves the equitable. (49.9)

A mention of the mercy of your Lord to God's servant Zachariah.
When Zachariah cried to his Lord a cry in secret,
Saying: My Lord! Look! My bones grow feeble and my head is shining with grey hair, and I have never lacked blessing in prayer to You, my Lord. Look! I fear my kinsfolk after me, since my wife is barren. Oh, give me from Your presence a successor who shall inherit from me and inherit (also) the house of Jacob. And make him, my Lord, acceptable (to You).
(It was said to him): Zachariah! Look! We bring you tidings of a son whose name is John; we have given the same name to none before. He said: My Lord! How can I have a son when my wife is barren and I have reached infirm old age? One said: So (it will be). Your Lord says: It is easy for Me, even as I created you before, when you were nothing.
Zachariah said: My Lord! Show me some sign. He said: Your token is that you, with no physical infirmity, shall not speak to humankind for three nights. Then Zachariah came out to his people from the sanctuary, and signified to them: Glorify your Lord at break of day and fall of night.
John! Hold fast the Scripture. And we gave him wisdom when a child, and compassion from Our presence, and purity; and he was devout, and dutiful toward his parents. And he was not arrogant, rebellious.
Peace on him the day he was born, and the day he dies and the day he shall be raised alive!
And make mention of Mary in the Scripture, when she had withdrawn from her people to a chamber looking East, and had chosen seclusion from them. Then We sent unto her Our Spirit and it assumed for her the likeness of a perfect human. (19.3-17)

Food for thought.